Things that are making me smile

I went for a walk to get a coffee today and our local coffee shop had this up. It made me smile (and want a t-shirt) so I asked the barista if I could take a picture of the sign. He seemed excited that people wanted to share it so I thought I would.

Seriously though… this needs to be on coffee cups and t-shirts… ooh and totes. You just know as a librarian, book lover and someone who is trying to reduce their waste that I love a good tote 🙂

Something else that made me happy recently is that my cover for my new phone arrived. At the beginning of the year I got a new Samsung S7 in rose gold. My contract for my old phone was a few months out of date so it was really time. I always have my phones in wrap round cases – I think it is what makes them last so long. I found a cover I LOVED online that I wanted so much that I literally waited a MONTH for it to arrive from Hong Kong. It only cost $12 though so BONUS!

Honestly, this looks even better in person than I thought it would. Often (as with my last phone case), when the item arrives the colour, quality or image are not as good as you had anticipated. With this product the colour is great, the quality of the materials and stitching is good. The names of some of the texts are a teeny bit hard to read sometimes, but if you are a Harry Potter fan you will be able to work out what they are 🙂

I was super pleased with this, it still makes me happy. The owl is SO cute. I really have a thing for owls, always have. My favourite are Tawny Owls, they are just so little and cute, Boobook Owls are also super adorable and have incredibly expressive faces… plus they have the word ‘book’ in their name 🙂  I don’t think it is overly fair to keep such beautiful animals as pets, but I would love to have them hanging around my place. This little sketch of Hedwig is probably the sweetest I have seen to be honest.

What has been making you smile lately?

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Raw: Infertility

Warning: this is going to be raw. I am not going to edit it and I am going to babble. I do not expect my thoughts to be flowing perfectly because that’s not what happens to my emotions when I think about this. This post is about the struggles of infertility from my perspective and I’m not gonna lie, there will be swearing and talk some people might find uncomfortable. Oh and it will probably be long. How long? Hmm… as long as I need it to be hahaha. 

I’m just going to say it, I am going to say what we are all thinking. Infertility is BULLSHIT! It is a horrible, no good, low down, nasty bugger of a thing!

Source: iaintskinny.wordpress.com

One of my fears growing up was that I would be barren, I have no idea why I had this fear. There was certainly no precedence for it, but have it I did and more than once I have wondered whether my fear somehow brought on my condition/s (AKA PCOS, Insulin Resistance and a slow as all hell metabolism). You know mind over matter and all that jazz. Obviously this is probably ridiculous, but you think a lot of strange things on the IF journey.

The IF journey has a huge effect on not only the women involved, but also their partners. If they are open about their struggles it will possibly also effect their immediate family, other children they have and friends.

I often feel as though the word ‘infertility’ could be used synonymously with ‘depression’ or ‘anxiety’ because in my mind there is no doubt it causes or greatly contributes to causing both. There is no way you could go through this process, this journey and not be affected by it, if I ever meet someone who says they aren’t I am going to ask what prescriptions they are on because I need to get me some of that!

Each month is this stupid mental and physical roller-coaster. Let’s have a look shall we…

From day one of your cycle (first day of Aunt Flo (AF)) you are cramping, in pain, yet dedicated to trying for a baby so you are already basal temping first thing in the morning and recording it down like a dutiful soldier (let’s not mince words here because you are fighting the war against infertility). For those who haven’t experienced this let me be more clear, we take our temperature and write it down, then chart it to figure out when we are ovulating. We do all of this first thing when we wake up of a morning before even sitting up in bed. We do this everyday of our cycle, which means we do this every day of the year, every year until we fall pregnant (or switch methods).

Once AF has finally disappeared a new game begins. Depending on how long you have been trying to conceive (TTC) you might be just basal temping, you might be using ovulation strips (you pee on them) to identify when you ovulate and there are many other techniques and/or medications you could be trying. Pretty much the further into the game you get the more you try. At this point I am more than 4.5 years into this baby making game… tenacity people 🙂 So here is what I do. I temp every morning, once AF finishes we then start the sperm meets egg method which involves having sex every two days, from the 10th day of my cycle I continue basal temping and back it up with peeing on an ovulation stick. Once I get a positive result we ‘try’ three days in a row, then skip one day and then have sex again. After that comes the wait, you’d think this meant a holiday which I would totally deserve as all the above is pretty exhausting whilst maintaining a full time job, house and eating, pooping and now apparently exercising and whatnot.

“The two week wait” – this sentence wets the eye of even the toughest of the infertility community. The two week wait is the space between when you ovulate and the end of your cycle. It is completely torturous and the whole time you are asking yourself if there was more you could have done to ensure pregnancy and you are praying and begging whoever is in charge up there to help you out. Trust me, it doesn’t matter how non-denominational you are, at some point you will pray. Naturally stress, anxiety and angst is probably not good for a developing embryo, but hey there is only so much chocolate one can eat and we can’t have alcohol because we are trying to get knocked up. ‘Knocked Up’ I used to enjoy that movie, now it just pisses me off.

The closer you get to the end of the two week wait the more anxious you become. You pay attention to every little twinge in your body, do you feel nauseated? You cup your breasts trying to figure out if they are bigger or sensitive. You have conversations with yourself convincing yourself over and over again that there is no point in taking a pregnancy test early because the results won’t show properly. How long can you hang out? This past month I made it to day 29. I had no indications whatsoever of AF, no cramps or spotting at all. So I tested, and… nothing. Big fat negative (BFN). Naturally I was upset, an hour later I go to the toilet and there is AF. Meanwhile what is this ‘Aunt Flo’ stuff? It’s a period. I HATE getting my period, but I love when my Aunts come to visit. It is a period in every sense of the word and the words it gives you when it comes are “You period Are period Not period Pregnant period Again period!”

Source: sachablack.co.uk

Then with the beginning of your period you are back to cycle day 1 and get to start the fun all over again.

You would think this would be enough to throw anyone off balance right? Right! But just for the heck of it, let’s add on some more stuff.

Amongst all of the above you will need to be seeing probably a GP and a Fertility Specialist (because we are all made of money too) and they might put you on Clomid which turn your ovulation cycles into overdrive, imagine if a normal ovulation cycle is a Nicholas Sparks novel inspired film like the Notebook, well Clomid and it’s awesome emotional side effects are the equivalent of Arnie taking on the predator. You will be WAY emotional, in fact on day 6 of my first round of Clomid I cried in the middle of a restaurant you can read about cycle 2 of Clomid here and here.

If you have PCOS and/or Insulin Resistance you will probably be put on Metformin which can also have some amazeballs side effects. Seriously you guys they are so awesome… not. In a post called ‘The Metformin Effect’ I discussed the fortunate and not so fortunate side effects of this medication and also have some very handy hints on how you can handle them until your body is used to it and settles down.

What is your fave colour?

If you have a lazy ass metabolism you will probably be put on something like Eutroxsig or Oroxine. This can be hit and miss and definitely look up the side effects in case you have a bad one. I was on Eutroxig at first and all my hair started falling out. Then I finally got changed to Oroxine and thank god the hair situation has calmed down.

Then you have the surgeries. Convinced I had endometriosis the specialist decided to do a laparoscopy complete with a uterus clean out, tubal flush and ovarian drilling (which is exactly what it sounds like). For me this was not fun. I also got an infection in one of the wounds which made me very sick and I still didn’t get a baby.

Then you can move on to IVF. This is where you spend your savings, or take out a loan/second mortgage, dip into your superannuation or just spend your future kids college fund on a variety of medications and medical procedures where they give you lots of drugs through needles to send your ovaries into crazy egg producing mode, you have a bunch of blood tests (more needles), then ultrasounds where they stick a wand up your vajayjay, then they put a massive needle up and through your vagina wall and into your follicles to extract said eggs (apparently some women are knocked out for this, but I got to experience it all in HD! Honestly one of the most traumatic experiences of my life to date), then you get to be completely angry at your partner because all they have to do is have a date with a sample cup. The sperm and eggs are put in a petri dish for 24 hours for their own date and then the angst begins again.

Sperm meets Egg

For me it went like this.

Because I had done wayyyy too much reading into statistics I decided that 11 would be a good base number… we got 9 so that was already disappointing for me. Overnight 6 fertilised which is more than 50% which is good so then I was happy. Come day 3 and 3 were looking good, come day 5 and only 2 were looking really good.

They transferred 1, more tubes and what not up my vajayjay freezing the other and sending a sample for genetic testing. Then I was sent home to start the dreaded TWW yet again (see above). My TWW did not end as hoped and there were LOTS of tears to be had.

Meanwhile your first period after egg retrieval and transfer is a painful SOB!!! Seriously it was SO BAD that the cramping disturbed my bowls and I had to leave work because the bleeding and diarrhea was sooo bad I could not be out in public!

Then there was more waiting to see if the embryo we had frozen was normal… 4.5 weeks later we found out it was THANK whoever is upstairs!

I truly hope that one day my journey ends with my husband and I having a child, but to date I can summarise my IF journey as follows: waiting, perfunctory sex, all of the NEEDLES and going broke. Not to mention the fact that I feel like my vagina should be charging admission at this point, she’s reaching studio 54 numbers now. And then there’s breaking your heart once a month when AF arrives or you don’t see that second line on the pee stick. I just want to earn my stripes!

There is still much for me to figure out like how to do those pee sticks without peeing on yourself… so hard to pee on teeny stick when you first wake up in the morning.

I have terrible days, friends, an unhealthy obsession with chocolate, fellow bloggers and a sick sense of humour seem to get me through. What gets you through?

http://www.reactiongifs.com/

 

The saga of A & E

I am posting from a place of serious tiredness today. I am not entirely sure my brain is functioning in any sort of what you would call ‘normal’ capacity lol.

Last night my brother took ill and had to go to hospital and his 3 and 4 year old daughters came to stay with us. I didn’t know this had happened until I checked my phone when I finished work at 5pm. Then I raced to get the shopping for dinner done and got home to enjoy the onslaught! Honestly I don’t know how my brother and his girlfriend do it. Major props to them. I adore these girls I truly do, but seriously they are cheeky, devious little ninjas who will always find the most inappropriate thing to play with and make the biggest mess possible.

I arrived home and immediately asked what was in E’s (3 year old’s) hair. Apparently she had decided her hair needed to be shampooed so got into the shower, pumped the heck out of the shampoo bottle and smeared it all through her hair.

It was like this! She went full Shia LaBeouf on me!

The she decided she wanted to play a game that was housed in a ziplock bag so instead of asking for help like a normal person she chewed the bag until she could get to the parts inside it! Seriously you can’t make this stuff up. Her sister A (4 years old) was actually pretty well behaved this visit, I didn’t have to talk to her too much for misbehaving except when she started acting out because E was getting attention for being naughty. A has been pretty well behaved at our place since she found out that if we threaten the time out corner we mean it lol. But she was still trying it on a little bit and not doing what she was told and whining a lot and interrupting and ignoring/pretending not to hear you if you were asking her to do stuff she didn’t want to – you know, normal kid stuff.

Back to E for while… apparently E has spontaneously developed a fear of the toilet. Before I came home she had already weed somewhere and after I got home I was desperately attempting to wrangle them both and throw together homemade pizza, E was playing with the doll house then climbed up on the kitchen bench. I told her to get down, there was some back and forth, but in the end she did it, then I see watery stuff everywhere. It took me a bit to figure it out (I actually figured I must have spilled something whilst cooking because why would I think the kid peed on the kitchen counter?), I realised there was more watery stuff on the floor and I could literally trace it to her. I talked to her about it (she is advanced for a 3 year old and truly knows she should be using the toilet) and asked why she didn’t go to the toilet to be told she “didn’t want to” and that she liked to wee in her pants. So we clean up her and everywhere she has been since she peed and I go back to making pizza. In the end something that usually takes me 10-15 mins to throw together took an hour by which time they were taking turns attempting to steal things from the pantry and fighting with each other and whinging about being hungry. Again normal kid stuff haha. Then there was the whole A standing on the table throwing a basketful of toys around the place whilst screaming with joy. That was so entertaining!

Pizza is cooked and even though they both adore pizza there is all this kerfuffle and a bunch of cajoling to get them to sit down to eat it. E is actually placed in her seat whilst claiming she doesn’t like pizza because it is too spicy. I go to the kitchen and debate with myself whether to try and make my mini pizza or just eat their scraps. Mum convinces me we should do the former, so we embark on that mission. Minutes later E comes running through the house with a piece of pizza flying about in her hand, I catch her and lead her back to the table whilst wondering if it is legal to restrain a child until they finish dinner. I finish making my pizza in record time and bung it in the oven. The girls are behaving because you know… food. My pizza is done and Mum and I ask Dad to keep an eye on them so we can eat.

Haven’t even gotten one bite out of my pizza before hearing Dad yelling. Apparently his view of ‘watching’ the girls is somewhat literal and he is barking orders from his chair whilst E merrily dances on the kitchen bench. I get her down and rowse on her, turns out they have finished their pizza. I give them a second slice. I decide to gobble down my pizza whilst watching a bit of netflix or something and go hide in Hubby’s office. Only to find that his recent rebuilding of the computer has meant everything works weird. So I sit alone quietly in the office eating my pizza and ignoring the thunder of little feet for awhile until I feel sane enough to emerge and help Mum and Hubby (who is now home and has fixed said computer issues).

The girls are bathed. E’s shampoo is properly removed from her hair. A decided to get her hair all wet in the bath so her hair is all messed up too. Both girls have very long hair, A’s is waist length and E’s isn’t far behind. When you have two little girls with very long blonde hair and a serious tanty throwing hate of the hairbrush you wish long and hard that they were yours and you could just shave it all off hahaha. After many months of work with them I am now the only person in the family (including their parents) that they will reasonably behave with whilst getting their hair done. I put in the ‘magic spray’ (AKA detangle spray) which ‘magics away all the knots’ and then when we are all done I do their hair very nicely (usually plaits because that is the best hair style to avoid knots for many hours hahaha) and we all look at their hair and ‘ooh’ and ‘ahh’. I still get some tantys during the process and so it can be a very long process. E wasn’t too bad because she was really tired by this point. She was complaining about it and I said she could go to bed as soon as I got her plaits in which she apparently took literally because about 10 minutes after I was done we found her in bed fast asleep.

A took longer. She is not into bed time and fights it like a pro! Her hair took a while because it was seriously bad guys. There were parts in there I thought I might have to cut out because they were matted with whatever she had managed to get stuck in it, but with a mixture of part conditioner part water I managed to work it all out. I plaited her up and then the had multiple stories and was put to bed, then put to bed again, and again. This happened a few times before I stood outside the door and sent her back to bed the second I heard her get up. Then she took to yelling out, she got in trouble for this and I told her if she woke her sister she would be in the corner for a long time. Eventually she drifted off at some ungodly hour at which point the clean up commenced and I poured myself into bed sometime around midnight.

In the morning I wake up to a massive crashing sound and E screaming blue murder. I come out to find Mum cleaning up her cup of tea after E apparently climbed up onto the kitchen bench (seriously she is obsessed) and when told to get down she somehow Chuck Norris’d Mum’s tea all over the kitchen.

This was after she peed in Mum’s wardrobe, I’ve heard of people peeing in wardrobes when drunk, but this was the first time I have heard of it happening because someone was looking at pretty jewelry.

E and A then proceeded to argue much of the morning over normal kid things like stealing each others chocolate milk and whatnot.

Then they were playing nicely on Mum’s piano until E wet herself and the antique stool *facepalm* at which point I put her in the corner. She screamed and cried and I got her calmed down and asked her if she understood why I was going to put her in the corner. She said because she didn’t go to the toilet, I agreed and reminded her that I had said if she did it again that she would go into the time out corner. She went quietly, but tried to make a game of it and got pretty sullen when she realised I wasn’t having any of that. After her 3 minutes in the corner I told her she could come out and speak to Nan and she apologised for weeing on her chair.

Within 10 minutes we found her just as she was hopping off the kitchen bench again with a little bottle. Turns out it was nail polish remover and she wanted to ‘play’ with it. SIGH.

By this time it was 12pm and I had to go to work so I wished my Mum well, kissed and hugged the girls and came to work. I truly do adore my nieces through all of this, yes they can be naughty and cheeky and cause great messes and damage, but I love them so much and often get a lot of giggles out of their antics 🙂

I have no clue what transpired after I left or what condition I will find my parents and the house in when I return hahaha. GULP!

 

Day 6 – 1st cycle on Clomid

So I guess it is going well. I haven’t really had side effects thus far, well not really bad ones… okay, okay I cried in the middle of a restaurant.

Before you say anything it was not over spilled milk okay 🙂

They had the smooth grooves cable channel on at the restaurant we were in and this song came on I have always liked, but never seen the film clip too, it is called “Say Something” and is performed by A Great Big World and Christina Aguilera. It is a hauntingly beautiful song which on its own is quite sad, but then it turns out that the film clip is even more heart wrenching.

So when you get to the old man with his wife on the bed… all of a sudden I had silent tears streaming down my cheeks. Hubby freaked out because I am not a crier and was all, “Oh my god, are you okay? What is wrong? Did you cut yourself?” and I am all, “It’s just so beautiful and sad”. T’s like, “umm okay, what can I do to help you? What do you want to do?” and I just asked him to hand me a napkin. He did and said, “how about we order you Brownie?” hahaha ahh he’s a lovely man. He is so done in if we end up with a girl 🙂

Other than that I have found myself really impatient with stupidity this week, but to be honest I think that is more a symptom of AF than the Clomid. I have had some discomfit in my pelvic region today which is weird, kinda crampy and all. Who knows what that is? Could be digestion for all I know hahaha.

Fingers crossed this works

The Squirrel Effect

Remember how a few posts back I talked about my New Year’s Resolutions and one of them was about accepting home truths? Well here is another for the pile 🙂

It is what I call ‘The Squirrel Effect’. I am a pretty creative person, I love creating things, I love trying new things so am always starting new projects and buying ingredients to try new recipes. The problem I have come to realise is that sometimes I lose interest… or my interest shifts to something new… AKA SQUIRREL! [if you don’t get the reference go and watch Disney’s Up!]

I decided to write this post after reading “Good boss, Bad boss” on LauGraEva’s blog, I remember that I first discovered this about myself when I was my own boss working at home. I was younger and had the misconception that I would have so much more time because I was working from home; I was wowed by the fact that in the middle of winter I could wear my flannel PJs and UG Boots to the office 🙂 Needless to say I very quickly realised that watching Firefly whilst answering work emails was not a good plan when I replied to a client informing them that everything was “Shiny”.

The same thing happened when I was unemployed for two months last year, I thought I would have so much time and I would be able to keep up on everything in the house and get a bunch of projects done that I had been unable to start… pfft… didn’t happen. I did get some vegies planted and caught up on washing, I also cleared out the closest and sent a bunch of stuff off to charity, but there was so much I didn’t get close to touching which was seriously disappointing! I even used to make deals with myself like: ‘okay, we are putting a wash on now, you can watch one episode of Big Bang Theory and then you have to go and put it out’, but then invariably I would try and find things to do inside like the project I started creating Christmas decorations by up-cycling books… that was way fun… and messy and kind of took over my coffee table for a week before Hubby got the royal poos 🙂

At the moment I have 2 major projects that I need to get too, one is that I found a vintage bird cage by the side of the road and I have the idea of somehow turning it into a succulent planter for my mates for their combined 30^th bday – they both like up-cycle/vintage so I think they will love it. Then Hubby had to go into hospital etc. and long story short their birthday has come and gone and I haven’t finished it 😦

it’s because of the Squirrels…

I also have a project I desperately have to start and finish before October for my Best-Friend’s wedding and…. I was about to tell you all about it, but then I have just realised that I think she reads my blog from time to time and so I cannot tell you about it, but it is pretty awesome. I have never done anything like it before and actually have no idea whether I am able to do it, in theory [AKA according to my hella awesome research] it will work, but in practice… who knows.

My point is that these two projects in particular I really need to get done and I can’t afford to

SQUIRREL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What a hot mess!

You hope for many things when you go through those first stages of setting up your blog, you hope it is a spicy hot roaring success, you hope no one boos you and you desperately hope that you don’t suck at it! Let’s be honest here… you want Tucker Max level fame. You want a blook, you want your blook turned into a movie… you pretty much wish for the stars because, well… why wouldn’t you?!

I am always interested in who visits my blog and how they find me so I check out my stats page generally once a day. So today as per normal I head on over to my stats page, generally my viewings don’t go up until later in the day as most of my readers are still asleep when it is lunchtime in Australia 🙂 so I wasn’t really expecting much… I was actually going to look at yesterday’s results. But before I could click on yesterday’s stats I got a little shock that I found under the “Search engine terms” area, please see screen shot below:

Umm… sorry… WHAT?!

What the… WHAT?!?!

First of all… YUCK! Why is someone looking for that? Who wants to look at anything cut open.

Second of all… Wait… how the hell did they get to my blog by Googling that?!?!

So you know what I had to do right?

Seriously, it had to be done

I had to! I had to know how and more importantly WHY that search brought them to my blog as I know I have not written about “smelly cysts” in… well… EVER!

So I hit the search button because at this point I certainly was not feeling lucky and held my breath. The results came back – 669,000 okay so that is not that high for a Google search, but maybe it was a fluke and I am buried way back in the results somewhere. Skim page one… SAFE! YES! Skim page two… SAaaa…oh shit. There I am… smack in the middle of page two.

Oh my god you guys!

The title that comes up really does not make things any better, no silver lining to be found in that unfortunate title at all. Just so I am quite clear… I do not roll with “grungy smelly cysts”. Grungy, smelly musicians… yes, but the smell is created by a fun day at a festival – not cysts.

What a hot (apparently smelly) mess! I am pretty much freaking out and thinking

http://moonflowerlights.tumblr.com/

So what do I do? I mean I am not about to delete all that content (which ranges across a few different posts) because I was happy with that content, so what should I do?

Then I realised that the only reason someone would be Googling “grungy smelly cysts” is probably if you had one and if you did have one you would probably be a bit sad.

So the only appropriate thing to do would be to write a post with a bunch of references to “grungy smelly cysts” so that my blog hopefully makes it to page one of the results next time someone Googles it 🙂 Let me know if I succeed if you dare to try it haha.

 

Loosely inspired by The Daily Post’s Ring of Fire challenge. I happened to be reading it just before I found this and got inspired 🙂

Social Media Addiction

So a little while ago I read this post http://kristenlynnwrites.com/2014/03/04/if-our-great-grandmothers-wouldve-had-facebook-and-twitter-when-they-were-young-mothers/ by Kristenlynnwrites and I loved it, it struck a chord with me, but in a different way than I would have expected when I started reading the piece. As I kept reading and giggling my way through the tweets I started thinking about the fact that because they didn’t have social media etc. they probably had a lot of time for other things. Then I read a comment by http://mrhairybrit.com/ that basically said exactly what I was thinking, “… the next generation is going to be a little lost in the world of social media”. I completely believe this in fact in some cases I feel like this is a bit of an understatement 🙂

Social media use is a little bit out of control, there I said it. Don’t get me wrong I use it, I absolutely use it and having lived in a few different places I find it a fabulous way to keep in touch with people I possibly wouldn’t be able to afford to keep in touch with otherwise. In fact I have done a lot of research and study into measuring and getting value out of social media technologies (which is likely evident from my last post) so I am certainly no Noob when it comes to the 2.0 world. What I have a problem with is the people that get so involved with their social media platforms that they basically spend more time posting their life on one platform or another than living it, that is where I think there is an issue. I believe we need a rehab clinic for social media addiction because trust me it is real!

http://www.9ddot.com/

So here are some prime examples of things happening on social media that drive me nuts:

• Mums and Dads posting every breath of their child’s existence. Guys your kids want to make a connection with you, not the lens of your smartphone, put that down and play with them; you don’t need evidence of being a decent parent. In fact if all your interactions with them are through the lens you are not really exhibiting great parenting skills, stop observing and get in there! Someone doesn’t have to ‘like’ it on Facey for it to have meaning.
• This next one was over the line and a totally legit reason to de-friend someone – recently the wife of a friend of mine had a bub, afterwards she posted photos of her C-section on FB… not okay! I wouldn’t want to see myself cut open like that, let alone anyone else… keep it in the family.
• My husband and I got married 2 years ago – people were really surprised when it took us a month to change our relationship status to married (I don’t really know why they cared to be honest, but apparently it was a thing for them). When we were looking for someone to do our ceremony we kept seeing references to a Facebook inclusion, when I eventually asked what it was we were told that a lot of people after signing the register like to have an extra part where they update their status’ on Facey to say they are now married… ‘umm okay, no we won’t be having that. Yes I understand it is popular, we still don’t want it’. Since when was the ring, ceremony and massive party not enough evidence of the ‘I do’?
• Selfies have gone too far! Yes I have taken them, yes I have posted them, yes I love the famous Ellen selfie, it is fabulous! But enough is enough… I do not need to see Belfies (Butt-selfies) which are just pure grot and who thought of that anyway?! The sheer amount of duckfaces I have seen in the past year have made me irrationally hate Daffy Duck a much loved icon of my childhood. And I have to say it… WTF is with after sex selfies?! How is this an okay thing to do? Vent, vent, vent, whinge, whinge, whinge. As a Librarian I have to admit that I do enjoy Shelfies, it’s a guilty pleasure to be able to have a perve at others bookshelves from the non-judgemental corner of my own home 🙂

http://images.dangerousminds.net/uploads/images/bookshelfie222.jpg

So people go on with all these conspiracy theories about Big Brother watching and the government spying on everything we do, the thing is that if they wanted to they wouldn’t have to work very hard. I mean seriously, we are posting our entire lives to social media, all they would have to do is write an extremely basic program with some search terms and it would pull all of your information up. I can literally go onto my Facebook page right now and tell you everything one of my friends had to eat yesterday; seriously he posts every meal… I don’t even know what I had for breakfast yesterday, but I know he had a full continental breakfast in the lobby of a hotel near his work… does that not worry anybody else?

We have basically created our own strange version of The Truman Show; we have done this to ourselves. We are too quick to post stuff and we don’t think about the consequences, for example, did you know people Google you when you go for an interview? If you Google my brother’s name a certain way you will find a video of him setting off fireworks out of his butt from 5 years ago. Once the information is out there, you no longer have control of it.

What do your uploads say about your personal brand? http://www.brandnewmedia.com.au/blog/the-facebook-makeover

So people please think before you upload and if you fit into any of the examples I have spoken about please seek a 12-step program in your area.

The Big Bang Theory – A love story

 

 

 

My first foray into BBT seems so long ago now, my [then] boyfriend sat me down and said, “you have to watch this it’s so hilarious”, considering some of the utter crap he had exposed me too in the past I must admit I sat down with a fair amount of trepidation and a neutral smile plastered on my face.

So the show begins and two guys walk on, from the way they are dressed they are obviously supposed to be societies accepted view of ‘nerds’ and I think to myself ‘sigh another one of those nerd shows where it’s all about comicon’ and then they walk through a door into a medical facility, the receptionist requests they wait and goes back to her crossword at which point one of the ‘nerds’ looks over and gives her all the answers ‘I think I would hit someone if they did that to me’ and then…

Receptionist: Can I help you?

Leonard: Yes. Um, is this the High IQ sperm bank?

Receptionist: If you have to ask, maybe you shouldn’t be here.

Sheldon: I think this is the place.

Receptionist: Fill these out.

Leonard: Thank-you. We’ll be right back.

Receptionist: Oh, take your time. I’ll just finish my crossword puzzle. Oh wait.

Oops that was a giggle… the neutral smile turned into a real one. Then in the short conversation that followed they discussed the fact that to go through with donating sperm would be ‘genetic fraud’ as there was no guarantee the offspring would have a high IQ. Then the laughter really began, it wasn’t so much that the script itself was hilarious, it was that I have met people like this. In fact I remember going to a Christmas function for my Partners work (works in IT) and after the guys got off their faces (we girls were still sober because someone had to get them home safe) they started what they thought was a very serious and meaningful conversation about the evolution of the condom from history to present day, this included listing the animals parts they were made from and discussions as to how useful each was and a discussion on the manufacturing process of condoms both in ancient times and today (in case you’re wondering the popular consensus was that in the past people most likely manufactured their own rather than purchasing them at ‘Ye Olde Condom Kingdom’ and that in all likelihood they were reused until perforated).

After that first episode I became addicted, mostly because I found hilarity in the similarities between the characters and people I have actually met. I have met someone that has MANY of Sheldon’s quirks (AKA rampant undiagnosed/untreated OCD) this includes the crazy food and daily regime. For instance if they are at work they go to the toilet at the same times each day and use the second last toilet stall, if someone is in there and they can’t pee they become visibly distressed. One of the funniest times was when I went grocery shopping with them and something on their weekly list (seriously the same list every week) was not available. They refused to believe the store had completely run out and made the clerk check everywhere, when none were found they asked to speak to the manager and lodged a complaint that the stores ordering policy was floored. By this time I had already abandoned them for the coffee shop outside.

Then there was the time I went to see the new Conan movie with my [now] hubby and his mate, I’ll be honest I was mostly there to see Jason Momoa in a loin cloth. The lights go down, the popcorn crunches, the choc tops start melting and the movie begins… the first fight scene erupts in an amazing choreographed display of visual rippling muscle awesomeness and hubby’s friend exclaims, “I wonder what the stats are on a sword like that?!” queue me choking on my drink!

Raj can’t speak to women… I know a guy who magically develops a MASSIVE stuttering problem when confronted with women in person (he works in a call centre – he can deal with them over the phone).

Howard is a perve who lives with his Mum… this is so so common it’s not funny. Seriously have you never seen the movie failure to launch? If not don’t bother, Zooey Deschanel is the best thing about that whole movie, just google it and read the summary. Basically it’s all about 30+ year olds that refuse to fly the coop!

Sheldon is some kind of crazy mix of anthropomorphic robot, OCD nut, Einstein-like, celebrity stalker, arrogant nerd with border-line personality disorder who looks like an awkward serial killer when he smiles. I have never met a serial killer, but I certainly wouldn’t be surprised to see Jim Parsons with a cameo in an upcoming Criminal Minds episode – I’d believe that! The rest of these personality traits I have seen, just never in the same body. Perhaps he was constructed by aliens and put on Earth to drive everyone nuts! My favourite parts are when he has no clue of societal protocol or urban slang, “What exactly does that expression mean, ‘friends with benefits?’ Does he provide her with health insurance?” or “You bought me a present? Why would you do such a thing? I know you think you’re being generous, but the foundation of gift giving is reciprocity. You haven’t given me a gift, you’ve given me an obligation. The essence of the custom is that I now have to go out and purchase for you a gift of commensurate value and representing the same perceived level of friendship as that represented by the gift you’ve given me. Ah, it’s no wonder suicide rates skyrocket this time of year. Oh, I brought this on myself by being such an endearing and important part of your life…”

Leonard seems to be the only truly straight man in the show as all other characters seem to display some level of pansexuality at one point or another. The few times you see him in a t-shirt you realise he is actually a built little unit, which is odd for your stereotypical ‘nerd’, but then I suppose when you look like the offspring of Brooke Shields and Eugene Levy you have to make something to even out the ‘brows! His interactions with Sheldon and Penny really make the show and he is a great catalyst for a lot of the humour in the show… of course it could just be that he is greatly expressive with the eyebrows and they work as a distraction. He is the non perverted version of Howard (with MUCH better dress sense – seriously Howard just because all the things you have on are green it doesn’t mean they should be worn together!) he really wants to have relationships and even gets into a few, but is just not very good at maintaining them, some element of insecurity and craziness always gets in the way… which pretty much relates to most failed relationships throughout the history of time.

Since this is now incredibly long (possibly my longest post ever) I feel it is time to bid you adieu. Whilst I am positive there are massive non-lovers of BBT out there and I appreciate your opinion, you will not change my love for the show. I think if you don’t know people like this the show can seem fake, but when you do know people like this it is just hilarious. I am currently searching for the original pilot as it was apparently extremely different and only 2 characters made it to the show we now know and love!

Here’s one of my favs from Penny the corn fed Mid West All American girl with a lotta spunk about her:

Penny: Give my friend his stuff back.
Tod: I don’t know what you’re talking about.
Penny: Well then good news! Today’s the day a girl’s finally going to touch you in your little special place. *Kicks him in the groin*

Who of these characters weren't in the original line up?

Baby names

In the past friends have randomly hailed me a baby psychic due to my uncanny ability to guess when people close to me are pregnant before they have told anyone – and in a couple of cases before the person themselves knew. I also seem to have a pretty good hit rate on guessing the sex of the baby. I don’t know why… no I do not think I am psychic and no I will not be able to do it for you. It only works with people I am really close to, I just know! So weird, but anyway I digress…

Over the past year people have changed (or evolved) that opinion of me – they now think I am a stork or something. I think last year was just a huge baby year, but it seemed that a huge majority of the people I regularly spend time with fell pregnant. Out of 12 pregnancies only 1 was planned! And in 3 cases the fact they are pregnant is a miracle in itself, one has had 4 miscarriages – she is now 6 months pregnant, one has cystic fibrosis and was told she wouldn’t be able to have children – she is expecting a baby girl in a few months and the third my maid of honour who found out she was pregnant the morning of my wedding was told she would probably not be able to have children due to being very ill with Anorexia for years. She and her husband have now been married 5 years and they have never fallen pregnant. It does seem a little bit more than coincidence really, you might think 12 pregnancies out of all the friends and family I have might not be much… my hubby and I each had 4 attendants. 2 of his groomsmen’s wives popped not long before the wedding, one of my bridesmaids popped just 2 months before the wedding and another found out she was pregnant the day of the wedding (meanwhile if you count back – she got pregnant after my hens night haha). So half of our attendants had babies in the lead up to the wedding… my 2 brothers gf’s had babies and one is pregnant for the second time now too… crazy stuff.

So obviously I have been exposed to a lot of baby name talk… bit more than I can handle sometimes. My first nephew is named Hendrix (yes his father is a muso),

Hendrix

they are about to have another boy and want another music related name for him (well my brother does at least). So I tried to think of some not-to-freaky ones for them to consider… here’s what I came up with:

• “Lyric” is kinda cool.
• “Dorian” is a music node also known as Russian minor.
• “Reed” like for a sax is cute, but would probably spell it “Reid”.
• “Cash” like Johnny Cash – not the biggest fan of the name Cash though.
• “Travis” as in Barker.
• “Coda” could be another good one.
• “Harper” is Harp player.
• “Chord”.
• “Halen” like Van Halen

Most recent discussions have hailed “Zakk” as in Wylde as the most popular on their current list. I love them and all, but why complicate things by messing with a name like “Zack”? I could take ‘Zac’ or even ‘Zak’ but why is there an extra ‘k’?

Zakk Wylde

Some people are so cruel when they name their children, my Aunt’s partner for example is named Richard Edward Bloggs [surname changed for protection from embarrassment]. Therefore all his life he has been called, ‘Dick-Ed’, he is now 60… poor bloke… mean name award to his parents.

The worst I have EVER heard was from my friend at flight centre (she showed me proof so this is not a story) she had a lady come in to book a flight. Van asked for her name, the lady replied, “Ladasha”, Van questioned the spelling as she wrote, “so is that L-A-D-A…” the lady interrupted, “No, no, no La-Dash-A”. Van asked her to spell it for her, the lady replied, “L-A-DASH-A”, Van gave up and asked her to write her name down… her name was quite seriously and literally spelt “La-a”. Mean name award to her parents.

And don’t even get me started on the bloody celebrities naming their children, Apple, Astronaut, Blue, Sunday, what’s next? Banana?

Hi my name's Banana

I remember a friend telling me that her husband was rejected from filing their son’s birth papers, their name is Walker, they named their son Luke and the father decided to change the middle name to Skye between leaving his wife in the hospital and getting to Births, Deaths and Marriages. Apparently the lady looked at the sheet, looked at him and said, “your wife doesn’t know about this does she?” she shamed him into leaving! Good human award to her!!!

Rule of thumb people, if you would be embarrassed to have the name as an adult… don’t give to your children. Age old rule of think before you act!

My Favourite things

Okay I will admit it, I am a total and complete “lister” I like lists, I love reading posts created by other “listers” (yes it is a word, because I say so! If ‘bootylicious’ can be a word then ‘listers’ is a shoe-in!). I have decided to embrace my love of lists after my previous post and after trawling through the hilarious musings of Barb Best http://barbsblast.wordpress.com she’s awesome check her out!

Now, when I say, “my favourite things”, I don’t necessarily mean objects like chocolate (although that is definitely high on the list) as I feel this is a bit limited. Plus running of a list of objects I love kind of feels like when I ask my 2.5yo niece what she loves and I get back, “Mummy, Daddy, Horsie (plush toy), Indy (families dog, she can’t say dog though – if she sees a big dog it is called an “Indy”, if she sees a small dog it is called a “Shorty” which is her Nan’s dog’s name – SO cute!) & Chuggington! So I am not going to limit myself to objects, I am discovering that my posts are as much about what I want to say as what I want to share with others, so here are my self discovery musings for today.

These are not necessarily in order, well except for the first one.

1/ Family – there is nothing better than family time, ‘laxing out on a weekend for no reason with your siblings or your parents. My Mum is my best friend, I tell her everything, she is my Hero and the reason I wanted to become a Librarian.

2/ Going to sleep to the sound of rain pattering on my window – it’s just so relaxing, does it make me need to pee? Sometimes, which is frustrating, but generally this is only when I needed to in the first place.

3/ My fiancée – 4 years on and he can still make me laugh until I cry, a practical thinker and not overly romantic, but thoughtful and very loving and a hell of a lot of fun! Quite intelligent and definitely not a bore to talk to on any number of subjects. Has been frequently mistaken for Charlie Pickering, he actually autographed something one day because the person wouldn’t leave him alone, good thing they didn’t check the autograph though because he signed it as himself and once went clubbing decked out as Jack Sparrow, practiced for a week to get the walk and talk just right and as we were walking through the city was actually asked to come into clubs and was paid $50 by some dude on the street for being “f***ing awesome bro”. Light of my life, I look forward to many interesting years ahead of us and god help us if our children are as crazy as either of us!!!

4/ A massive belly laugh – is there anything better? Think about your last really fabulous chortle, cackle, guffaw (possibly accompanied by a pretty decent snort), how brilliant did you feel afterwards?! Laughter is definitely a perfect prescription for most any ailment. Almost as good as an orgasm, but not quite… and sometimes just as much clean up 😀

5/ Chocolate!!!!! – NOM NOM NOM does this really need a reason? It just is and it is perfection! Someone should write a blog about it, I can see it now… “Travelling the world… one chocolate tasting at a time”. Chocolate used to be a form of currency, it is probably a good thing it isn’t anymore as I would be oh so poor, in fact lactose intolerant people would rule the world because everyone else would be eating their money!!!

6/ Music – Music is like the weather, no matter what it is it will have some affect on you, some will love it, some will hate it. Music is like modern day poetry and just like poetry some of it belongs on the wall of a public toilet and some belongs in the halls of fame! There is nothing better than driving along in your car and pumping some song that makes you so gleeful and singing at the top of your lungs (yeah that is probably me at those traffic lights). Nothing more special than singing to a crowd and seeing how you are effecting people (hopefully in a not wanting to stick fingers in their ears way).

raaga-raga.blogspot.com

7/ Friends – I have some friends that I consider my brothers and sisters, I truly embrace the ideal, “friends are the family you choose for yourself” – I have no idea who said this originally as I have seen it so many places. Recently saw it on a plaque in someone’s bathroom right next to, “if you sprinkle when you tinkle, be a sweetie and wipe the seatie” not sure how they relate, maybe it’s just me.

8/ Work – I am one of the people lucky enough to love my job, I am in the exact organisation I have dreamed of working in and have the satisfaction of knowing that I got myself here through really hard work and a lot of crappy jobs that I took just to get me experience in the right stuff. Plus the access to books is awesome!!!

9/ The beach – I can be wound as tight as a boa constrictor on it’s prey, 5 minutes sitting in the sand listening to the waves and I am as relaxed as a new born with a full tummy. I don’t know what it is, but the beach just speaks to be on some base level, it balances me out somehow. No I am not a water sign, I am a creative, firey-ass Leo… it literally feels like being at the beach just moderates the flame for a while or brings down the internal temperature. I don’t understand it, I think something that feels that good (and is legal) doesn’t warrant an explanation.

I was planning to be really unique here and stop at 9 because most lists have this innate need to make an even number and 10 is a pretty clichéd number, but couldn’t leave out this last one…

10/ Animals – I adore animals, and I detest anyone that abuses animals! My fiancée and I have taken in 4 dogs, 3 cats, 3 birds and a pregnant guinea pig over the years, all of which were badly treated and we have found homes for more animals that we just couldn’t help. People say animals take more than they give and they are beneath us, I don’t think that is true. It’s not like I am asking for dogs to have the right to drive cars or vote or anything, but I don’t think they should be kicked around and treated like garbage and I know that the animals we have rehabilitated love us unconditionally. They don’t care if I haven’t done my hair or make up, or if I have blemishes or stink because I just got back from the gym, when’s the last time an animal called you fat? Much kinder than humans, although if you don’t have them de-sexed they do “spray” pretty much everything, marking it as their own, which is a ‘fowl’ experience! (Pun intended hehehe :D)